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Sledgehammer

Subtle: So delicate or precise as to be difficult to analyze.

Yesterday during Jiu-Jitsu class, Amy said something that really struck me. She was explaining a technique to Joe, and she told him he needed to be more “subtle”. It’s not like I haven’t heard the concept before, Conan says the same thing. He’s always telling us that Jiu-Jitsu is “a game of inches”, and that we should learn how to be “sneaky”, but for some reason when Amy said that, I was struck by how unsubtle my fighting style is, in both Jiu-Jitsu and Karate. I’m not subtle at all, I’m like a sledgehammer. I am the Gallagher of martial arts! I don’t even have a subtle fighting style when I play video games. I don’t like missions that require stealth, because I just want to run headfirst into the fight.

So, how’s that been working out for me? Well, in video games being unsubtle often leads to my death, but luckily I get a new life every time! In martial arts, my mad sledgehammer skills really only work on white belt watermelons. The colored belts usually see me coming from a mile away, and they just avoid my attempts to smash them, until I wear myself out.

My aggressive fighting style might work better for me if my body actually closer resembled a sledgehammer, instead of one of those tiny pink lady hammers. It’s become painfully obvious to me that I need to learn to be more stealthy, even though it goes against my basic instincts. Years ago my Karate sparring teacher told me that he was worried I might not survive a street fight, because I only have one direction: Forward, and two speeds: Fast and Stop. It’s time to lay those old bad habits to rest.